The 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil

The World Cup is the most widely viewed sporting event in the world, with millions of people tuning in to watch 32 national teams competing for the famed gold World Cup Trophy. And while soccer is big around the world, here in Brazil they are fanatical about it  its the most popular sport and a very important part of the culture for Brazil. The national team is among the most successful in the world, and for Brazilians soccer is a passion.

So when the host nation for the 2014 FIFA World Cup was officially announced in October 2007 you can imagine how happy the people of Brazil were!

This will be Brazils second time hosting the championship, and the host nation will be trying to bring the trophy back to Brazil for the sixth time. Its going to be a very exciting tournament, and if youd like to catch some of the matches live, heres a quick guide to whats happening.

When is the 2014 FIFA World Cup?

***travel_top.shtml**The 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil will take place over a period of 32 days from its start on June 12 until the World Cup finals on July 13.

Where will the 2014 FIFA World Cup be held?

Aside from the obvious, Brazil, there are twelve venues that will be hosting the Brazilian World Cup, and they are spread over 12 cities. This is a change from the normal policy of between eight and ten cities, but the additional cities were approved by FIFA.

The twelve cities are spread all over the country, starting with Manaus in the north west, then heading south and east to Fortaleza, Natal, Recife, Salvador, Cuiaba, Brasilia, Belo Horizonte, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Curitiba, and Porto Alegre.

Its already been decided as to which stadiums within those cities will host the games, and half of them will be rebuilt stadiums, built specifically for the 2014 World Cup, so visitors will be able to enjoy state of the art venues, while five others are being upgraded.

The opening match, for which tickets are going to be in high demand, is being played at the New Corinthians Stadium in Brazils largest city, Sao Paulo. This new stadium is going to have a capacity of 68,000 people which although fairly vast is nothing like the 174,000 people who packed into the Maracana stadium in Rio de Janeiro for the World Cup Final in 1950! Brazil was in that final, though they lost to Uruguay 2-1.

The legendary Maracana stadium will be the venue for the World Cup Final on July 13, 2014 though. It doesnt have such a large capacity as it did back in 1950, but following renovations and upgrades that are taking place right now, it should be able to seat around 85,000 by the World Cup.

Buying Tickets for the Brazilian World Cup

As the time of publishing, tickets are not yet on sale for the 2014 World Cup, but you can keep an eye on the official FIFA website for information on when tickets will be offered for sale. In the meantime, you can start planning your trip to Brazil by deciding which cities you would like to visit. If youre a soccer fan your decision is probably going to be determined by who youre supporting, but as its such early days the qualifying matches have not yet been played.

One thing is for sure, the larger cities like Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro will no doubt be more popular than some of the smaller ones, so dont count out some of those smaller cities as you may be able to get better tickets for those matches played there.